Humanity Divided
by Doomevil
Summary: In the Mojave Wasteland, strange faces appear all the time. Even the most unexpected people such as the Newspaper Club have taken experience as their abilities are no longer working from their realm. Trapped in a miserable sanctum of death, the gang faces realistic odds they've never encountered before. It's a dog eat dog world now...


A hand slowly grasped the thick container that consisted of rancid coffee from the counter. Her firm hands held on to the container and poured the coffee onto a cup for the gentleman. The gentleman looked straight at the bartender giving his coffee, letting out an approving nod. "Thanks." He followed.

"No problem." She replied back, pouring at least four cups beside the gentleman as the bartender saw four woman. One was notably pink-haired, one was lavender, while the other one was blue. There was also the child sitting next to them who wore a hat that felt out-of-place in these kind of towns. The bartender couldn't care less if she gave the child coffee whether it would be cold booze or Nuka-Cola, as long as she had the caps for it.

"You guys stand out like Fiends, but I guess since you're not looking for trouble then I'd wager you're not one of them." The bartender watched them take sips at their drinks. She made a curve to her mouth upward and figured they were grouped together. In the Wasteland you need to have a couple of friends with you to even the odds. The only male in the group gulped down and placed his cup on the counter, wiping his mouth with his forearm. His eyes were baggy from all the walking at the afternoon.

"Not at all Ma'am. We're just traveling around, heading west to set up a settlement." He said, looking up as she nodded. To her, the bartender might as well give them the bad news about settling on NCR territory, especially when it looks like she's seeing a group of teenagers traveling. She pressed her hands against the counter, looking at him.

"I hope you have the caps to spare or at least NCR currency, NCR isn't too keen on lending you a free service in their territory. Taxes are the norm now." She said, noticing a frown on the teen's face, as well as the other four. She took pity but that was generally expected from travelers who were seeking to settle down. "What's your name?" She bought up, wiping away the dirt inside the glass. He felt a little reluctant on stating names, but swayed the idea since she did had time to talk to him.

"Tsukune Aono." He answered to the bartender, following with some watchful eyes from his friends. He saw the bartender nod yet left a smirk on her face. She ensured she will never forget that name in her book, it felt too abnormal but judging by these people, they were Asian. The bartender made sure she also gave out her name, it was fair enough he gave a polite answer so she might as well return the favor.

"Lacey." She left her surname out intentionally, she didn't feel it wasn't important enough to get the gist to them. She glanced at the four women, seeing the pink girl looking at her. She was wearing the typical wastelander attire but more covered that you could barely see her skin exposed. Lacey saw the silver rosary beneath her chin, she knew she was going to be that kind of gal but she shouldn't judge so harshly.

"You four?" Lacey asked. All four caught the question and sprang, looking at the bartender as if they needed to force an answer from their mouths. "Moka Akashiya Ma'am." The teen said with an assuring smile, Lacey noted the Ma'am part, tracking it to Tsukune's polite gesture. These kids were definitely raised to be polite turned up to the maximum even when the world couldn't care if you're a sadist.  
Extremely rare in Mojave, if not the entire country.

"Ma'am? Did your parents raise you to be that polite to strangers?" Lacey asked, resisting the urge to chuckle at the positive and cheerful girl. Moka felt her heart stop as Lacey mentioned the key word parents. But regardless of the past, Moka kept a straight face and positive outlook.

"I like to be positive towards people." Moka curled one of her pink strands. Tsukune looked at her and could only gave a smile, it was her attitude that bought the gang in place. Her cheerful smile is something to get inspired by, but that was just him saying awfully nice things to her.

"That's an attitude you don't see every day." Lacey muttered, turning to the rest.  
"Kurumu." The second woman said as she held her cup in her hand. Taking a large gulp and setting the cup down as her last drink for the day. Kurumu turned to Tsukune, a bit annoyed that Moka was closer to her destined one than herself. If anything bothered her than Moka, it was this ransack place.  
She already saw a couple of individuals sleeping around the barracks, snoring, paying top dollar for some whiskey. She wanted to go somewhere that didn't had that. Somewhere where she and Tsukune could be all alone together.

"Yukari." The child with the outlandish hat said, taking a sip from her coffee. The other one with lavender hair simply stared at her coffee as her directive was to cool it off. Her emotionless expression didn't help out what she made of this hot coffee. "Mizore…" She answered without looking at the others, placing her elbow on the counter as she sighed.

A pleasant gang. Lacey thought, sarcastically speaking by their introductions of course. Judging by the rest the only three who managed to have a positive outlook on the side of life were Moka, Tsukune, and Yukari. The other two knew this wasn't their place to have a good time. Lacey being the regular barkeep, took Kurumu's cup after she was done, following Mizore who didn't even drank the coffee that was given out to her.

"Miss, who are Fiends?" The young voice suddenly asked behind her. Lacey turned to the girl with short hair, curious to know. But to honest, hearing a person asking what's a fiend in this land of territory especially close to New Vegas was extremely rare. She wanted to know what kind of rock were they living in to not know who were the most bigoted psyched up junkies across the Mojave. She stared at her with such contempt, she must be either naive or sheltered.

"Fiends? Honey, they're the most fucked up people I've ever seen, if you have any useful items you're carrying and I generally mean some cooked up chems then you better run before they catch you with it. They'll find anything to snort or smoke on." Lacey explained.

Lacey sighed and bought up another topic. "If you're looking for a place to stay today then look no further, the barracks still has some leftover room to spare for five of you." In reality, a place to stay for a while was nice enough for breaks but Tsukune's gang needed to keep moving around after learning about NCR's rules on citizens, not to mention the taxes from Lacey. They weren't entirely convinced but it was left up to the other four to decide if it was worth moving west now.

"No, that's fine. We're not planning to stay at this place for long." Tsukune informed her, realizing they would only waste their time. He extended his cup towards the barkeep, taking Moka's cup when she was already done. Soon after everyone wished to leave, new visitors came at a reasonable pace as time grew close to sunset. Tsukune rose from his barstool, dusting away his wasteland jacket, not wanting to delay their inevitable walking.

"Right, thank you for the coffee. We're going to head out." Tsukune said, signaling his gang to part from the counter. Moka suddenly pulled Tsukune's arm unexpectedly, pulling an innocent expression on her face as she reminded him what he needed to do. It all hit him immediately that he needed to pay for all drinks. Oh how dumbfounded he was. Tsukune had a messenger bag beside his waist, unzipping it to further reach around for the correct amount of caps for five cups of coffee. He placed the bottlecaps onto the counter, seeing Lacey grab the caps within her reach and place them into her pocket.

Tsukune couldn't imagine what got merchants like Lacey to sell things for bottlecaps, they were just metallic pieces of scrap. What valuable are they worth to the economy? Though in a few days back in a town called Sloan one person mentioned the bottlecap currency was tradition ever since the world came to be. Understandable, but could it been something other than a bottlecap?

As the gang take their leave, Moka thanked the bartender by introducing a respectful bow to Lacey, leaving the barracks. Lacey barely know these kids but she felt an odd fondness for them so quickly. She let out a grin and actually surprised herself. Perhaps young kids gave her the slip sometimes, she's so used to seeing adults roaming around the wastes but not young people so much.

She saw a familiar face down from the barracks, a drunken sod out of bed so late at this time who marched forward. Lacey shook her head in pity as she saw the woman in denim jeans sit nearby. She also sported the typical cowboy hat.

"The usual Lacey, whiskey. Just whiskey." The dulled out voice said as Lacey gave her a snarl expression. She grabbed two clean glasses just for her, she knew her stomach could take such alcohol, might as well give the queen of whiskey whatever quantity she wanted from the inventory stock. Lacey popped the cap off, pouring a whiskey bottle into both glasses.

"You drank four glasses of whiskey today, how much of a streak are you going for Cass?" Lacey asked her as she saw Cassidy gulp down half the glass content within seconds. She placed the glass down harshly, scratching her forehead if that was a trick question to answer, only to get annoyed by Lacey's bickering for the past few days. What did she want her to do while she was sitting here? Work? Eh, fat chance in hell.

"Enough to knock my ass out of commission for good." Cass replied, not bothering to keep a straight face at the bartender giving her flak.

* * *

The gang walked across the Mojave Outpost to see the sunset at the horizon, noticing the scorched weather taking place. The unbearable climate along with the caravan chokehold made things here a bad time for business. Several caravans were left with no service to cross through the roads without supervision from NCR troopers. As far as Tsukune knows word of mouth, NCR is tapped out and can't spare the troopers for caravans. It was a shame really, they're running on scarce water if they don't pull it together.

Speaking of scarce water, Tsukune believed they were running on it too. The current amount of non-expired food was short, caps were low. He grimaced about the situation and realized the trip from Nevada to California is going to be a long walk from here. This was their time to speak about plans.

"Alright guys, maybe traveling to the west doesn't seem like a good idea." Tsukune blurted out as the girls looked at him with confusion. Particularly ever since they've got in the Mojave their major plan was to go California for better opportunities than this desert hole. Each one seemed very unsure if he was making sense at this point.

"Why not Tsukune? We've heard the locals here, California is a better chance for survival other than here." Moka reasoned with him. If anything, survival was their important mechanic to rely on if they were going to find a way out. What better place they could go?

"You heard what the bartender said, NCR are probably going to tax the hell out of us. Not to mention it's a long walk from here, and what's our game plan then? Get minimum wage jobs and work off the crops until our backs hurt? Stay in a poor house? Live on the streets?" Kurumu questioned in general. The idea to get out of Nevada was a smart idea, but can it secure their lifestyle? Apparently it won't. Their definition of an average house was probably a barrack that contained a toilet and a kitchen at the minimum. It also factored their current finances. Tsukune was afraid to admit they were dirt poor, even they had trouble buying essentials. What they need was to find work.

"Let's face it, we don't have the funds to secure a house in California." Kurumu concluded, crossing her arms in a sternly manner across this subject. There was no future for her lover to live in a hut.

"Pardon my pessimistic attitude, but I actually agree with udder jugs." Mizore said, alarming her rival at top speed yet managing to agree with a subject. The Yuki-onna caught wind of Kurumu's deadly glare at her but resisted, keeping focus on the real plan ahead.

"How about this guys?" Yukari bought up, snapping her fingers to bring up a plan that could interest both arguments at the same time. She pulled out the spare bottlecaps from her pocket, letting the gang observe them. "We all know by now that bottlecaps are the main currency in the Mojave, we also don't have the funds to secure a good quality standard of living. We find work and save up, ration our supplies and maybe, just maybe we could manage a good quality place out there until we have enough. That way we don't have to worry about poor standards." Yukari explained.

In the wasteland Yukari has realized that caps aren't something you should throw away but keep as money. The long term goal was simple: Find any work or jobs that could land them with some dough. Save enough caps or money to land somewhere safe back in California. The question was _how much was enough?_ Right now a rough estimate in Yukari's mind could range in the thousands. Maybe even more if they weren't lucky.

Moka still felt convinced that immediately going to California isn't a bad idea, the places there were safe, order is established. Sure, they might have to work hard to eat well, but it's better than fighting gangs. But overall it was the majority choice to decide what was best for the group.

"I guess that could be a reasonable idea Yukari." Moka said, earning a smile from the child. Oh Yukari, at least you always strive for a third option for the benefit of everyone. Moka thought. She hated for Yukari to be in this situation with them.

"Right, let's just find some work around here. Or not." Tsukune urged them to do, looking around as caravans such as the merchants were placing their cattle in cages, feeding them with herbs. Mercs polished their makeshift weapons along with guarding as they were paid to do. Mercenary work seemed promising, but dangerous. Their options of work were limited to say the least, for once they might have the qualms to move on to another location. Tsukune grabbed his messenger bag along with a few others to carry on his back, feeling the intense weight bear down on him. All four couldn't help but notice he was carrying all the bags.

Yukari giggled, holding her hand against her mouth and pulled one of the bags off his back. Kurumu, Moka, and Mizore watched this kind gesture, following pursuit as they pulled one each for themselves to carry. Tsukune turned and nearly objected. "Girls, I got it. You don't need to carry the bags." Tsukune assured them. Moka stood in front of the rest, giving a smile towards her friend.

"Tsukune you do too much, let us help." She was genuinely worried about his state of being, no group of theirs were going to handle the heavy lifting for the rest. If anything, it was togetherness that made them more effective as a group. Tsukune got the point and chuckled. What was he thinking? These were the friends that would risk their lives just for him, they were too stubborn to go through with his decision.

"Alright." Tsukune declared one last time as they departed off to the North. They closed in onto the two statues shaking hands, Yukari spotted the memoir inserted right above the statues, observing the description what these gigantic men represented. She narrowed her eyes as it came down to a simple agreement between two factions, a truce in all its glory. If only those agreements were easier when it came to Humans and Monsters. A cooperation between the two races were idealistic at its core, but had a feeling it's not impossible to achieve someday. Yukari turned her eyes to her group and walked off on the roads as the sun settled.

The group paced among the unmaintained roads overwhelmed with decay, searching for any junk items to use later like a pack of scavengers. Though in this world they were scavengers, looting everything you could find out here is the most common tactic there is. Tsukune watched for any unusual activity around the area, these roads can bring out the most legitimate organized criminals to sneak up on wastelanders. Ever since they entered the Mojave, Tsukune used a small revolver taken from a cache two weeks ago. It wasn't fancy nor was it in great condition, but it didn't matter, any gun can do the same job.

He wasn't alone using a firearm, Kurumu and Mizore got used to firing one too. Mizore having a mother that had a gun hobby helped while Kurumu soon learned on her own. From the far distance, Tsukune squinted his eyes, soon enough spotted a shack from the roads. Okay, we're getting somewhere. Tsukune thought gestured the four to follow in his tracks as he reaches for the shack house. Observing at normal view the shack was made out of rusty scrap, the exterior wasn't a good sight of a house, but the chances of this being a base for function rather than a dream house grew.

"Guys, we're going to enter this house. But I'm not sure we can just barge in." Tsukune huddled the group, their faces were of determination.

"What do you need for us to do?" Mizore asked with curiosity. The scenarios of entering through that shack varied. Were there innocent people in there? Wildlife infestation? Possibly abandoned. Neither one of them knew. Tsukune looked at Mizore, the rest were confused, but went along with it as they gazed the Yuki-onna. Mizore raised an eyebrow as she saw her friends stare at her. In a few seconds she already knew what she needed to do.

"I guess I'll be the stealth expert." Mizore shrugged. She walked beside the shack and simply pressed her right ear against the cold steel, hoping the shack wasn't thick enough to hear noises coming in. The result of her ability was silence until she heard steps. The steps she was hearing, however, didn't sound like shoes, but rather bare feet. It was too vague to describe but they definitely weren't shoe noise. She felt inclined to make noise of her own to attract this person. She gave a few audible knocks on the wall. Suddenly she heard the noise coming closer to her position.

Mizore gritted her teeth and ran straight to her group. She pulled out her HP Browning she found not too long ago, loading the magazine as she cocked it. She narrowed her eyes as Tsukune pulled out his revolver while Kurumu grabbed her single shotgun. Moka and Yukari watched the events unfold, unholstering their melee weapons for good measure. The sounds of dread hurried outside as the door immediately slammed against the wall.

The person was actually a creature of minimal size, sharp teeth and had reptile eyes. The group encountered these creatures far from here, they processed the doctrine of a wolf pack but more deadly. The locals liked to call them Geckos.

"Shit!" Kurumu yelled out, pressing her finger against the trigger as her shotgun fired towards the Gecko with an enormous muzzle following. Another Gecko sprang from the shack as its pack member's head exploded into gibs. The sounds of a shotgun sounding off alerted the pack to their presence. This was bad. Two more Geckos appeared, blood lusted for vengeance as the three charged their attack on the group. Mizore fired from the side of the shack, injuring at least one Gecko on her view. The Gecko in view received a minor wound hole at the side of its torso, resisting the urge to give up until its prey is dead on the spot.

Mizore along with Kurumu fired repeatedly from their point of view. Tsukune was relentless on letting one live by today. The overall guns gaining advantage over the small and puny Geckos dying from gunfire were an easy score. Their only chance of winning the fight all by their own was slim at best.

Moka dealt the final blow to one Gecko that remained, hitting the creature with a wooden baseball bat. The gang sighed a load of fresh relieved no one got hurt in the process. The ones who fired guns checked their ammo and how much they had left. Moka and Yukari unequipped their weapons and observed the creatures that they've slain. Moka took pity, it wasn't an act of malice these Geckos were doing, and they were simply doing this out of instinct. She couldn't blame them.

Yukari watched the interior inside the shack, attempting to walk in until a hand grabbed her by the arm. She saw Kurumu give out a stern look across her face. "What the hell are you doing? You can't just walk in there." She warned her. Kurumu volunteered to go first, shifting her young friend aside as she aimed for any hostiles. The small interior had a bedroom for one person, a fallen down radio set that deactivated. She watched her surroundings, seeing no signs of dead corpses except the recent ones outside. "All clear guys!" She shouted out, bringing in the four to see the wrecked place.

Tsukune checked under the bed for any items or caps, but nothing of the sort so far. Mizore opened a few boxes to show nothing in return as Moka opened up a locker. Moka was intrigued by the item she just found lying there without a care. She dusted the portable machine in her hand and saw it could literally fit into her forearm. Kurumu turned towards Moka and gave out a taunting laugh.

"Whatcha got there Moka? A toy?" She stared at the portable machine which was hideous by electronic design standards. She snatched it from Moka's hand which she nevertheless earned a glare from her being rude. Kurumu fiddled with this arm watch of some sort. Flicking a small power button below using her thumb to trigger the activation. She watched as the portable lid up with green text, loading its features as the gang watched. A small figure appeared on the screen, completing the activation at 100%.

"America has weird stuff lying around." Kurumu muttered, throwing it on the floor as the arm thingy gave an alarming thud. Yukari was enraged, this was an object of technology that could be valuable. Yukari remembered she gave a remark that anything valuable can be sold on the spot. She stared at Kurumu with a frustrated look.

"What the heck was that for?! That could be sold or used you idiot!" Yukari exclaimed, receiving a look that showed she couldn't care less. Moka and Tsukune walked to the thrown object, observing the text naming this thing the Pip-Boy 3000. Tsukune smirked and surely noted this was a piece of equipment used for survival. "Nice, I wonder why anyone hasn't taken this yet." He wondered, finding the latch open, he fitted the Pip-Boy onto his wrist, placing it over his sleeve as he clipped the latch on, locking it. Moka giggled at the weird boy and his gadget all set.

Tsukune smiled as he found Moka giggling at the sight of his new watch. Mizore closed the containers on the shelves, turning to see the rest as she walked in the center.

"This place is empty, all I found were 8 caps." Mizore muttered, audible enough to let her friends hear her in disappointment. She pulled out the caps she found scavenging through the place. It was something but not quite on to the rich side of life. On the bright side, they did find an object of valuable use to their survival.

"Way to go Ice Queen, only a thousand more caps to find." Kurumu said without sarcasm applied. The rest walked out of the shack as the crows scattered the desert. The warm yet corrosive sand flowing through the area from strong winds up ahead. The last member that exited to shut the door, not bothering to clean up the pile of Gecko corpses laying near the entrance.

 **(Want to want out what situation put them inside the Mojave Wasteland in the first place? Why aren't they using their monster abilities? Tune in next time.)**


End file.
